If we’ve learned anything from the midterm election so far, it’s that the Inflation Reduction Act is no cap-and-trade bill. Meaning: Democratic efforts to pass monumental climate legislation this year did not tank the party in the midterms, as they did 12 years ago when Republicans swept the House and won 11 gubernatorial races. The GOP’s successful rallying cry in 2010: Democrats’ cap-and-trade proposal for greenhouse gases would kill jobs and raise energy prices. That message helped tank the popularity of the policy, despite cap-and-trade’s origins as a market-based system beloved by free-market conservatives . (Under such a system, the government would limit pollution levels and then let polluters buy and sell their allowances.) Republicans aimed similar warnings of job losses and other economic havoc at the Inflation Reduction Act, of course, and not a single GOP lawmaker voted for it. But this climate bill had a difference: It was full of consumer tax credits and clean energy cash goodies that stand to benefit red as well as blue states . In essence, the Inflation Reduction Act marries reductions in greenhouse gas emissions with economic development — a potential political game changer , writes POLITICO’s E&E News reporter Benjamin Storrow. Time will tell if this approach to climate policy makes a lasting impact on electoral outcomes, but the shift in strategy certainly hasn’t hurt. In fact, despite the red wave predicted by polls and pundits, Democrats have held onto half a dozen competitive governorships, won two others and wrested legislative control from Republicans in Michigan and Minnesota. While the party is still expected to lose the House, a large number of the most competitive seats in the chamber remain uncalled. And Democrats’ prospects for holding onto the Senate, which hinges on two states and a Georgia runoff, remain decent. Perhaps wary of the legacy of cap-and-trade, many Democratic candidates didn’t play up their success in passing the biggest climate bill in U.S. history on the campaign trail. But Republicans didn’t mention it either — an indication of the law’s perceived popularity. Abortion may have been the issue that turned the tide for Democrats, but polls show that combating climate change is popular among both Democratic and Republican voters. A recent Pew Research Center survey found that 58 percent of the country thought the government should do more to address the climate emergency, including 47 percent of Republicans ages 18 to 29. Meanwhile, voters are getting constant reminders about what’s at stake. According to new projections, the world is on track to warm 2.7 degrees Celsius by the end of the century, dramatically overshooting the 1.5 C target set in the 2015 Paris Agreement. Boosting clean energy deployment is slated to significantly cut planet-warming emissions. But climate scientists are clear that the world needs to move away from burning fossil fuels, if we want to stave off the worst of climate change. And that remains an uphill battle.
| 
